Best of the week: Love, death and the Blue Ranger

Pecha Kucha Volume III

MANILA, Philippines - Remember show-and-tell from nursery? In Pecha Kucha Night, Ideals Creatives’ pow-wow event bar none, speakers from different fields present a 20-slide slideshow on anything they want with 20 seconds per slide. For Sept. 2’s Pecha Kucha, they’ve got a typically varied bunch—from fashion photographer Mark Nicdao to spirit ouster Peachie Valera.

Pecha Kucha Night Volume III is on Sept. 2, 7:30 p.m., Shangri-La Plaza Mall Cineplex 4.

Aaliyah’s Ninth Death Anniversary

Nine years later and it still shocks. On Aug. 25, 2001, teen-star-turned-multimedia-force Aaliyah died in a plane crash on the way back to the US from the Bahamas. It was one of the generation’s first high-profile deaths, the first time one of our celebrities, someone we grew up with, died. With her Sade-like mystique and street sensibility, Aaliyah was definitely on her way to greater things. Nine years later and all we’ll ever know are the hits, hits that still sound fresher than anything the Ciaras and Rihannas are dishing out —Try Again, Are You That Somebody, We Need A Resolution, At Your Best, the list goes on and on.

Tag Team Of The Year: Lady Gaga And Britney Spears Collaboration

The Internet has been abuzz about a tandem that will surely command a massive army of fans. Fans went crazy when Brit tweeted a few days ago that she was going to see Gaga. Fans have concluded that the two will either record a single together or perform at the upcoming MTV Video Music Awards. Is anyone even ready for a Lady Gaga and Britney Spears collaboration? Will this coup overshadow Britney’s collaboration with Madge? Well, watch out in the next couple of weeks, people. We know we will.

David Yost Aka Blue Ranger Comes Out

If you were born during the late 1980s or early ’90s, you probably grew up wanting to be one of the spandex-clad, alien-fighting Power Rangers. But apparently, all was not well on the set. In a recent interview, Blue Ranger David Yost came out of the closet and then admitted that he left the show because of harassment and harsh name-calling. But like every good queen, from Babs to Mariah, the Blue Ranger overcame it anyway and has since found a career as an active member of the LGBT community and the NOH8 campaign. The real Pink Ranger rises!

Quote of The Week: Venus Raj’s “Major Major” 

Everybody just can’t get enough of Venus Raj, the country’s latest major, major beauty pageant placer. Even Yahoo! US ran a story about her getting close to the crown, only to lose it in the Q and A portion. “It was a major major fail,” tweeps claimed on the microblogging site, making it trend for the whole day of the pageant. Major Major Venus Raj, thank you for giving us this week the diversion we needed from the major major crisis we faced. No one was more pleased than Veejay Floresca and Martin Bautista with their friends. A YouTube video of the girls excitedly (this is an understatement) watching the telecast has since gone viral, making it all the way to international gossip blogger Perez Hilton.

Excuse of The Month: China’s Epic Traffic Jam  

Everyone uses congested traffic as an excuse yourself for being late. Well, try this. Motorists entering Beijing have been stuck in traffic for more than a week in a severe case of traffic jam that could rival the length of their Great Wall. Most of the vehicles are delivery trucks that have been congested since August 19, due to maintenance on the National Expressway 110. Drivers are already feeling homesick, being literally on the road for days. Road side residents meanwhile put their entrepreneurial skills to the test, blowing up food prices four times the retail price. Imagine if this happened in the Philippines, P-Noy might use a wang-wang after all. 

Stop Me! Award: Ipod Stops Train Schedule   

In Japan, even suicide attempts (or successes, at that) do not stop their trains from moving. They just keep moving forward. But in a bizarre twist, one lady successfully stopped a coach from its trip when her iPod burst into flames, apparently from overheating. The schedule-strict Japanese turned out to be keen sniffers as well when passengers complained of an odor. This prompted authorities to delay the trip and search the coaches. A young woman came forward to show her ruined iPod, luckily not damaging any of her ears. Apple has declined to comment on the issue, though their steadily deteriorating image in Japan just got burnt again. 

Visionary of The Year: Man Dies After Receiving Cremation Receipt.  

 If somebody does this prank again, someone tell the prankee that he just got Punkd. A 70-year old Indian man died from a heart attack after receiving a receipt containing the details of his cremation that supposedly happened a week earlier. The man was overwhelmed with the prank and complained of chest pains. He was dead on arrival at the local hospital. The police are already investigating the matter, prying to find out if the intent of the prank was to shock the man to death. What’s more is that the dead man was cremated in the same chapel where the fake receipt was taken, and that the serial number 89 was on the receipt — same as the fake one.